10 Best Python IDEs to Use in 2023
Python is a general-purpose programming language for building anything; from backend web development, data analysis, and artificial intelligence to scientific computing. It can also be used for developing productivity software, games, desktop apps, and beyond.
It’s easy to learn and has a clean syntax and indentation structure. And an IDE (Integrated Development Environment) can, to some extent, determine one’s programming experience when it comes to learning or developing using any language.
There are many Python IDEs out there, in this article, we will list the Best Python IDEs for Linux. Whether you’re new to programming or an experienced developer, we have you covered.
1. PyCharm
PyCharm is a powerful, cross-platform, highly customizable, and pluggable Python IDE, which integrates all development tools in one place. It is feature-rich and comes with two variants – a community (free and open-source) as well as a professional edition.
It provides smart code completion, and code inspection functionalities, and has remarkable error highlighting and quick fixes. It also ships with automated code refactoring and excellent navigation capabilities.
Has built-in developer tools such as an integrated debugger and test runner; a Python profiler; a built-in terminal; integration with major VCS and built-in database tools and much more. It is very popular among Python programmers and designed for professional developers.
2. Wing Python IDE
Wing Python IDE is a highly customizable and flexible, professional Python IDE with a powerful debugger and intelligent editor. It enables interactive Python development in a fast, accurate, and fun manner.
Some of its well know features include extremely powerful debugging capabilities, code navigation, integrated unit testing, remote development, and so much more. If you love using Vim, then Wing amazingly binds with the Vim editor.
It has rich integration with App Engine, Django, PyQt, Flask, Vagrant, and beyond. It supports project management and version control with Git, Mercurial, Bazaar, Subversion, and many others. It is also becoming popular among Python developers, and many users now prefer it to PyCharm.
3. Eric Python IDE
Eric is a featured-rich Python IDE, written in Python. It is based on the cross-platform Qt UI toolkit, integrated with the highly flexible Scintilla editor control. It has an unlimited number of editors.
It provides a configurable window layout, configurable syntax highlighting, source code auto-completion, source code call tips, source code folding, brace matching, and error highlighting, and offers advanced search functionality including project-wide search and replace.
Eric has an integrated class browser and web browser, an integrated version control interface for Mercurial, Subversion, and Git repositories as core plug-ins and so much more. One of its most important features, which lacks in many Python IDEs is an integrated source code documentation system.
4. PyDev For Eclipse
PyDev is an open-source, feature-rich Python IDE for Eclipse. It supports Django integration, code completion, code completion with auto import, type hinting, and code analysis.
It offers refactoring, a debugger, a remote debugger, a tokens browser, an interactive console, unit test integration, code coverage, and PyLint integration. It allows you to find references using the (Ctrl+Shift+G) shortcut keys. You can use it for Python, Jython, and IronPython development.
5. Spyders Scientific Python IDE
Spyder is a scientific Python IDE with many features for research, data analysis, and scientific package creation. It ships with a multi-language editor with a function/class browser, code analysis features (with support for pyflakes and pylint), code completion, horizontal and vertical splitting as well as a goto definition feature.
It has an interactive console, documentation viewer, variable explorer, and file explorer. Spyder allows for searching queries across multiple files in your project, with complete support for regular expressions.
6. Pyzo Python IDE
Pyzo is a simple, free, and open-source IDE for Python. It employs conda, an OS-agnostic, system-level binary package manager and ecosystem. However, it works without any Python interpreter. Its main design goal is to be simple and highly interactive.
It is made up of an editor, a shell, and an assortment of useful standard tools such as a file browser, source structure, logger, and an interactive help feature to help the programmer in various ways. It offers full Unicode support in both editor and shell. And you can choose between different Qt themes to use.
7. Thonny Python IDE
Thonny is an open-source Python IDE meant for beginners who have no prior knowledge in Python learning and development. It comes with Python 3.10 and has very basic and simple features that can easily understand by new developers.
The basic features include a simple debugger with F5, F6, and F7 function keys for debugging code, offers an option to view how Python evaluates your expressions, highlights syntax errors, auto code completion support, and a Pip package manager to install 3rd party packages.
8. IDLE Python IDE
IDLE is an open-source and popular Python’s Integrated Development and Learning Environment for beginner-level programmers who want to learn Python development programming with no prior experience.
IDLE is cross-platform and comes with basic features that enable you to edit, run, and debug your Python projects in a simple graphical user interface. IDLE is coded in 100% Python program and it uses the Tkinter GUI toolkit to build its windows.
9. GNU Emacs For Python Programming
Emacs is a free, extensible, customizable, and cross-platform text editor with the out-of-the-box Python support via “python-mode”. If you’re an Emacs fan, you can build a complete IDE for Python Programming by integrating the packages listed in Python Programming In Emacs guide in the Emacs wiki.
10. Vim Editor
Vim is a popular, powerful, configurable, and above all extensible text editor. It is fast and is often used as a Python development environment by many Linux users. To configure it as an IDE, you can start by using Python-mode, a plugin for developing Python applications in Vim.
VIM can be a pain to configure especially for new users, but once you get through it, you will have a perfect match (i mean Vim and Python). There are several extensions that you can use to set up a full-fledged, professional IDE for Python. Refer to the Vim documentation and Python wiki for more information.
Summary
An IDE can make the difference between a good and bad programming experience. In this article, we shared the Best Python IDEs for Linux. Have we missed any, let us know via the comment form below. Also, let us know which IDE you are using currently for Python programming.